


Resident Advisory

by schroedingersfox



Series: Resident Advisory [1]
Category: Iron Man - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Gen, Humor, Loki Does What He Wants, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Spot the character cameos, Tony Does What He Wants, Tony Stark POV, platonic for now
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-14
Updated: 2015-03-29
Packaged: 2018-03-01 11:09:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 11,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2770844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/schroedingersfox/pseuds/schroedingersfox
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Not even a week into his sophomore year and Tony's already butting heads with his floor R.A. It's not his fault that the guy seems hung up on things like <i>rules</i> and <i>procedure</i>.</p>
<p>He really, really doesn't like this guy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“Anthony Stark. You haven’t turned in your resident survey yet.”

The name made Tony wince and force a grin, waving his hand in dismissal of it. “Just ‘Tony’ is fine, really.”

“All right, _Tony_ , your resident survey—where is it?”

“And who are you again?”

Tony’s visitor leveled him with a look that said he wasn’t pleased. One black brow was arched and green eyes (that normally would have been nice to look at in other circumstances) were showing acute exasperation. Ah, well, it wasn’t an unfamiliar expression, to be sure.

The green eyes gave a small roll. “I’m Loki, your R.A., something you would have known had you bothered to show up to the _mandatory_ floor meeting on Monday. The survey was a part of your welcome packet—”

“—Pff, who reads those anyway—”

“—and again, had you come to the meeting, you would have been reminded of it.” Loki shifted his stance, one hand still holding a clipboard and the other stuffed in the pocket of his school sweatshirt, and leaned forward slightly so that he was eye-level with Tony. Something, of course, Tony noticed, and managed to rile him about the height difference in a way that verbal comments hadn’t done in years.

Loki continued. “You are currently the only resident on this floor who has yet to turn theirs in, so I suggest you start working on it.”

The banter might’ve been cute had Loki not been so utterly pedantic about the whole thing. It might’ve been a good icebreaker, even, an innocuous excuse to meet the neighbors when a chance hadn’t presented itself before. But no, Loki was serious, and Tony had a feeling that if he ignored him and shut the door in his face it would only make things worse.

He leaned against the doorframe to his room and gave Loki a smile. “Look, this isn’t my first rodeo, okay? I lived on campus last year, too, I know the general rules, and we all know those surveys are the same every year and one or two missing sheets aren’t going to make the ground open up for the end of days.”

“I daresay you’ve had more than your fair share of exceptions for the year already, Tony Stark,” Loki said after a pause. With a long exhale, he stood back up to his full height and flipped the first page of the stapled papers on his clipboard. “ _‘Stark, Tony’_ ,” he said as he read from the page. Tony found himself raising to his toes to see—was that a _file_ on him?

The clipboard was pulled back closer to Loki’s chest, and when Tony glanced up to Loki’s face he could’ve sworn he saw a faint smirk.

“Don’t worry,” said Loki, in (what was supposed to be?) an assuring voice. “It’s nothing sordid; merely your housing request.” He started reciting again. “ _‘Year: Sophomore. Preferred room type: Single. Reason: I have enough classes to worry about for me to worry about someone else touching my stuff when I’m gone.’_ Well, it’s certainly not the most convincing reason I’ve read, but yet here you are.”

He really, really didn’t like this guy. Tony stuffed his hands into his jeans and rocked back on his heels. “What can I say? My projects take up a lot of space. My roommates last year didn’t last long, either. I just decided to head off any problems before they started.”

“Someone on high must really like those projects of yours.”

Tony grinned wide.

Loki didn’t look impressed. “Let me remind you of your circumstances: you are a sophomore, living in a hall for upperclassmen. Technically, you shouldn’t even be here, let alone in a room by yourself with not much fight to show for it. Furthermore”—Loki stepped forward and Tony started back in surprise—“you are on _my floor_. I’m not going to fight your room assignment, but as long as you are on my floor, you will follow my rules. And as your resident advisor, I am _highly advising_ you to fill out the damn survey.”

A new copy of the survey was pressed against Tony’s chest, and this time he took a full step back away from the paper, hands up. “I have a thing about being handed things, sorry,” he explained, his tone lacking any hint of apology.

In a smooth motion, Loki suddenly set the clipboard on the floor, resting it against the wall. He rolled the survey, and before Tony could realize what was happening, hooked his finger into Tony’s front jeans pocket and pulled it towards him, slipping the survey inside.

“There,” Loki said as Tony looked at him aghast. “I’ve pocketed it for you, instead.” He bent down to retrieve his clipboard, and when he stood up again, he gave Tony an almost pleasant smile, but one you’d see on someone in retail who was a few customer complaints away from hurling a cash register.

“You have until noon tomorrow to drop it off in my mailbox or at the desk if I’m on duty. Please don’t make me hunt you down on campus,” Loki said, expression absolutely saccharine, and turned to walk away. “I have everyone’s class schedule, you know.”

When Tony stopped by the R.A. desk the next morning at eleven-thirty, sliding the survey across the desk with a grimace, Loki looked up from his work and a slow, cat-like smile spread across his face.

Tony felt like a goddamned canary.


	2. Chapter 2

Tony asked around about his new R.A.

And by asked around, he really just asked Rhodey, who knew a guy who knew the guy.

“I know a guy,” Rhodey said from across the booth, scooping some fries into the heaping mound of ketchup on the tray between the both of them. “Turns out Loki was his R.A. last year. Actually, he said he was really cool.”

At this, Tony scoffed and took a bite from his burger. A pickle slipped out the back of the bun and flopped onto the tray. He frowned at it.

“Let me guess, he’s ‘a really cool guy and no one had any problems,’ right? So I’m the exception?”

Rhodey leaned back in his seat and shrugged, palms facing up. “I don’t know what to tell you, man. People seem to like him.” His brow suddenly knitted together and he looked like he remembered something.

“What?”

“There was this one story I heard,” Rhodey slowly said, as though he didn’t want to interrupt his own thoughts. His eyes slid back to Tony and he pointed at him with a fry. “Same friend, lived on Loki’s floor last year, like I said. Some guy lived down the hall from him, huge stoner type. And even though the dude lit up nearly every day, no matter how many room inspections or complaints about the smell, no one ever found his stash. He didn’t get written up, nothing.

“Well one day, he comes home from class, right? And all of his furniture—I mean _all_ of it—was covered in weed and wrapped in plastic. It was like someone just sprinkled it all over his stuff and then used a store’s worth of plastic wrap and duct tape to turn his room into stoner decoupage. Problem solved. And as it turns out, he had been covering his smoke detector with plastic to keep it from going off.”

Tony, whose mouth had stopped mid-bite halfway through Rhodey’s story, set his burger down. “Bullshit,” he finally said, face locked into an incredulous expression.

“I’m just telling you what I heard,” Rhodey countered.

“Yeah, and I’m telling you, you heard _bullshit_. There is _no way_ Loki scared the guy straight with some textbook prank.”

Rhodey laughed at that. “Oh, no doubt, but the fact remains, the hall was apparently all roses after that. And besides, I don’t think anyone officially knows if it was Loki who did it or not. But R.A.s do have master keys to all the rooms, so it’s not like it was outside the realm of possibility.”

As he mulled this over, Tony must have made a face that Rhodey didn’t like, because his hand shot out and grabbed Tony’s arm. “Tony, no. I’m saying this as a friend. I see that look in your eyes, and whatever it is, it’s a bad idea. You need this guy to like you, and that means playing nice. That means going to all those floor meetings and filling out whatever survey, quiz, or horoscope he throws at you, okay?”

Lips pursed around his straw, Tony lifted his brows and looked the epitome of blamelessness. “What idea? I assure you, I have no clue what you’re talking about.” He closed his eyes and put his hand over his heart, adding in mock-gravity, “But I shall do my best to play nice.”

Rhodey gave him a crooked frown and shook his head, softly laughing despite himself.

“Your funeral, Tony.”

* * *

There were about twenty of them in all, everyone crowded on the couches and chairs of the floor’s common room. Tony had snagged himself a recliner in the back corner when he arrived, early enough to actually get a small look of surprise from Loki (and huh, that was satisfying), but not so early as to look _eager_ to be there. Feet tucked up under him on the chair, he pulled out his phone and scrolled through old emails with forced interest; it either was that, or fend off awkward small talk with neighbors he still hadn’t properly met in the past month as they trickled into the room.

The meeting started, and the longer it carried on, the more he was beginning to think that Rhodey had been telling the truth, that maybe people _did_ like Loki—which, the more Tony thought about it, was weird as all hell. He had to have a double, a twin, evil clone that did dirty work for kicks, like hounding down residents over inane shit. Because there was absolutely no reconciling who was sitting in front of him now with the guy he first met two weeks ago.

The reminders for the hall meeting were stuffed in everyone’s mailbox, but Tony had earned a second personal visit from Loki, just so he couldn’t play up plausible deniability. He had no excuse this time, and Tony realized it the second he opened his door. “Guess I’m still in the doghouse,” he had joked, but Loki’s face was stone.

Christ, he had a whole semester of this left, at _least_.

“Hall meeting is Monday at seven-thirty,” was all Loki had said in response, and contrasted with his face that said nothing—so very different from the clear look of exasperation of their first meeting—it had made Tony squirm until Loki was out of sight.

And now Loki was laughing. Genuine, light-up-the-room laughing at something one of the other residents had said.

Yeah, there was no possible way that this was the same guy.

“Well, I vote for a movie night,” someone said off to his right. _Double shit_ , what were they talking about again? Tony snapped his head back to Loki, wondering if his inattention had been noticed.

But Loki was focused on Movie Guy, arms lightly crossed as he seemed to consider the suggestion, definitely amused. “We’re only a few weeks into the semester; you need a break already?”

“Who doesn’t like movies?”

A few others voiced agreement, and Loki eyed the room over before gesturing with his hand. “All right,” he said with mock defeat and wrote briefly in the notebook on his lap. “It seems I am outnumbered. Those who lived here last year: you know the drill. For those that don’t, I’ll take suggestions in my box until Thursday. Unless, of course, you all want to watch _It’s a Wonderful Life_.”

Someone else called out, “But it’s only September!”

That got a toothy grin from Loki. “Then you had better give me alternatives.” He suddenly checked his watch and closed his notebook. “Movie announcement will be on the bulletin board this Friday for a showing that night. Bring donations for pizza, and please do remember surprise room inspections will start next week for the following two weeks.”

Tony groaned with the rest of the room at that non-sequitur of a last announcement. It wasn’t that inspections were inherently awful—no, wait, yes they were. They were categorically inherent in their awfulness, and Tony already knew that if Loki was the one in charge of doing them, there was no chance in hell he would be able to get him to skip over his room. He had nothing to hide, but it was still _his room_ , and the thought of someone purposefully snooping about and poking around his stuff left a sour taste in his mouth.

“See? That wasn’t too terrible, was it?”

Loki was standing in front of him now, looking down at him and speaking in a tone that was bordering on sympathetic, if not for the fact that he was obviously pleased with himself. The rest of the room behind him was slowly thinning out, a few stragglers remaining to chat and gather their things.

Tony leaned against the armrest of the chair and shot a half-grin upwards. ( _Why was he so freaking tall?_ ) His shoulders rolled with the movement of an exaggerated nonchalant shrug. “Yeah, I guess it was all right.”

He stood then, shoving hands and phone into his pockets, as Loki took a step back to give him room, watching him with those bright green eyes. Green like—like grass on a summer day, or—shit, what was he doing, why was he thinking in _metaphors_? In _bad_ ones?

Clearing his throat and looking away, Tony asked, “So, room inspections, huh? I take it you’re the one stuck with the job.”

That smile was back again, but it looked a bit more crooked than it had earlier. “That I am,” Loki confirmed, walking with him towards the hall.

Tony chanced a teasing grin. “Going to stock up on plastic wrap over the weekend?”

As they reached the hall to part ways, Loki stopped and gave Tony his full attention. But instead of looking confused, he looked almost _impressed_ , his smile only spreading wider. “Now why would I do that?”

So he _had_ done it.

Before Tony could maneuver any more details out of that might-as-well-have-been-a-confession, Loki adjusted the bag on his shoulder and leaned in close. “A tip for inspections,” he said, voice low like he was telling a secret. “If you can hide it, you can keep it.”

“Wait, what?” Tony could only blink at that, brows furrowing as he swiveled around, and the movement put him right into Loki’s personal space. His face brushed the front of a black sweater, and he jerked back in surprise.

Pulling away, Loki only said, “Goodnight, Tony,” his impish features suddenly irritating—how did Tony ever get sucked into thinking this guy might not that bad, the charlatan, everyone’s been _brainwashed_ —before turning around and walking down the hall towards his room.

Tony's hands hung limply at his side, watching as the door (reading RESIDENT ADVISOR and covered in a previous year's worth of seasonal papercraft decorations) opened and then closed, leaving him standing alone.

He was so screwed.


	3. Chapter 3

“Are you actually reading it, or are you trying to walk away with a cutout?”

Tony spun around with a start. Loki was sitting at the welcome desk to the residence hall, chin resting on his palm as he wrote in a notebook with small pauses to glance at the textbook. He seemed preoccupied, but Tony had a sudden thought of _maybe that’s the point_. He gave the bulletin board one last dubious look before walking towards the desk. “What would I do with a leaf made out of construction paper?”

Loki continued to focus on his writing but managed a shrug. “You’d be surprised which parts of the boards go missing.”

The curved desk’s high counter would half-hide anyone sitting behind it, if not for the open section in the front. Tony circled around to one of the higher sides and found it was perfectly elbow-height. So he leaned on the counter and asked, “So, is this one yours?”

Green eyes flicked up to meet his, before Loki set down his pen and gave Tony his full, begrudging attention.

Tony jerked his head towards the wall with the board on it, a paper-crafted tree in autumn colors with a pile of larger leaves on the bottom, highlighting the upcoming residence hall events. _Jump Into Some Fun!_

At seeing what Tony meant, Loki suddenly engrossed himself back into his notes with a speed that nearly gave Tony whiplash, and—wait, no. It couldn’t be. Was he _shy_ about it?

There was no stopping Tony’s grin, even if he had tried. “That would explain why you’re watching me like a hawk”—and _oh_ , if Loki’s eyes were any sharper they would have gutted him where he stood—“but hey,” he said, holding up his hands in surrender, “relax. I’m not going to ruin good staple work.”

The frown on Loki’s face slightly wavered. “Did you need your mail, or something?”

“What? No. Yes? Maybe? I haven’t had time to check my box yet, so maybe there’s something there, but I am expecti—okay then.”

Obviously tired of his chatter, Loki had stood up from his seat and walked to the back room. Tony felt like an idiot, just standing there with no one else around. He didn’t even know if Loki was coming back; it’s not like he had said definitively either way, _Let me go check for you,_ or _Shut up, Tony, I can’t deal with this right now._ His finger started tapping against the counter as he looked around like he was seeing the place for the first time, trying not to focus on the fact that he had been left there alone for five minutes already, no, fifteen; it’s been ages, where was he?

His eyes landed on Loki’s textbook, and he tilted his head as he tried to read the page from the side. Skimming over the text, he caught a few mentions of Boltzmann and molecular chaos. _Huh_. He didn’t peg him for a physics guy, but he also belatedly realized that he knew little to nothing about him.

The sight of stacked packages in Loki’s arms made Tony beam with delight. “Oh good, they came after all.”

Loki dropped them on the counter with a huff of exertion, looking slightly displeased with the brown boxes as though they had personally offended him. He pushed a lock of his black hair out of his face and behind his ear as he opened a folder on the counter.

“I’ll need you to sign for these,” he said, handing Tony his pen. While Tony signed his name and the date, he heard Loki say, “The back is filled with care packages.” It sounded almost apologetic, like an explanation for taking so long buried under the guise of small talk. “But from the weight, I take it these aren’t snacks.”

“Ah, no,” Tony said a bit too hurriedly, unable to hide a thin scowl from the thought of Howard sending him something like a _care package_. “These are parts for my research project. I couldn’t move forward unless they came in.”

Loki hummed, a small thing to let Tony know he was being listened to as he walked the mail folder back to the bookshelf. “Well,” he said, sitting back down into his chair, “I put mail slips in your box for these earlier, so you can ignore those now.”

When Tony didn’t immediately take his things and leave, Loki looked expectantly back up to him. Tony froze, _shit_ , and he racked his brain trying to think of what he wanted to bring up. There was something he wanted to ask him, _he swears_ , and of course, now that he’s on the spot—

“Right, uh. I saw the notice for the movie tonight. Are you still taking… Not movie requests. You already chose one. Obviously. The, uh, donations. How are you on donations? For the pizza?”

 _God_ , of course the donations were for the pizza. Of course Loki knew what he meant. He was babbling, why was he babbling? Tony felt more words threatening to spill out just to get Loki to _stop smiling and say something, goddamn it._

Mercifully, Loki turned to his bag and returned with an envelope, reaching inside to pull out the money and count it between his fingers. “Looks like…” he trailed off, giving a brief lick to his thumb to separate the bills more easily. “Seventeen dollars and fifty cents.”

Tony arched an unimpressed brow. “$17.50? Oh good, so you have enough for _maybe_ a large with no soda.” He shook his head and reached for his wallet. “Hold on.” Flipping through the bills, he pulled out a few and handed them to Loki, whose eyes widened in disbelief when he realized the amount.

“Tony,” he said in a soft reproach. “This is too much. I can’t take—” Loki cut himself off with a frown. “I normally buy three anyway, regardless of how much residents give.”

“Well, now you don’t have to go out of pocket for it,” Tony said with a shrug.

Loki still didn’t appear convinced, more unsure of how to react than anything, and he still had not actually accepted the money from Tony’s outstretched hand. Tony pointedly placed the bills on the desk and slid them towards Loki’s fingers before pocketing his wallet. It was suddenly difficult to look at Loki now for some reason, and he felt a small tension growing in his shoulders.

“Look, I’m not…” Tony sighed as focused his gaze on the packages in front of him. When he spoke again, his voice was quiet and a lot less sure than he had felt only a minute earlier. He really wanted to explain this right. “I’m not trying to show off, or anything. I don’t go to things like this a lot. Hardly ever,” he added with a small laugh.

He glanced back at Loki. His brows were still furrowed, but his posture had relaxed and he seemed content to let Tony keep talking. “And well, I decided I actually wanted to go, and if I’m going I want there to be enough for every—me. Enough for me. I’ll eat a lot. It’s definitely not a bribe for inspections.” The latter had been said playfully, and Tony even gave Loki a wink to go along with it.

Long fingers touched the bills as Loki eyed them thoughtfully, but then his expression grew sly. “Well, then. Is it a bribe?”

Tony grinned, relieved that the conversation had stopped being so _heavy_. “Only if it works. Will it work?”

“Probably not.”

“Then it’s not a bribe.”

“Definitely not.”

“Good. Then that’s settled.” Tony gathered the stack of boxes into his arms, and wow, they were deceptively weighty. “Use the extra for cinnamon sticks or something,” he said as he walked towards the elevator, immensely grateful that this residence hall even had one. “You look like a sweets kind of guy.”

Loki laughed, and gave in—finally!—placing Tony’s donation in the envelope with the rest of the money. “I’ll take your request into account.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It just keeps getting longer~


	4. Chapter 4

One hour, several restarted attempts, and a string of muttered curses later and Tony had actually managed to concentrate on freeing and sorting through the heap of various large and tiny parts. With only three boxes he should have finished it in half the time, but more than once he had caught himself staring into absolutely _nothing_ as he sat cross-legged on his floor. The worst part of it all was that when he tried to remember what he had been thinking about, he couldn’t. He had been staring at nothing, thinking about nothing, but it surely must have been _something_ , right?

His back protested as he sat up straighter from his hunched position, and he stretched his legs out in front of him with an obscene groan. His computer on the desk behind him was still blaring AC/DC, now on its second album having exhausted the entirety of _Back in Black_. He considered. AC/DC never distracted him before. Sure, it was loud, just like he liked it, but at a finely-tuned level that finally got his neighbor to stop banging on the wall. So it wasn’t that.

It was on the forefront of his mind, he could _feel_ it, like trying to recall the reason for walking into a room but ending up forgetting anyway. He dragged a hand down his face and scanned the room in front of him, and when his eyes landed on the cardboard boxes, he felt a nudge of recognition. That, yes, of course. It had something to do with the parts he had ordered. Did he forget to buy one? Shit, that would suck—he had checked the list thrice over when he placed the order. It took ages to ship to _begin with_ ; if he was missing something else...

Where was that damn notepad?

He pushed himself off the ground and tried to ignore the painful needling in his feet from sitting for far too long. The spare desk pushed to the side had most of his blueprints and mockups for his thesis: a learning, robotic AI. It wasn’t just going to pass the Turing test; it was going to _blow right through it_ , maybe even making up its own that would pose at least a _challenge_. And when—not if, definitely _when_ —he pulled it off, he was going to cash it in for his doctorate, because like hell he was staying here any longer than he had to.

The list was hidden under a mug of day-old coffee, a brown crescent moon staining the upper corner. Tony waved it triumphantly at no one and took it back to his main desk, absently enjoying having double the workspace with none of the roommates. Well, the ones that could talk. Bending down, he reached in to the small tank at the back corner to check the dampness of the sponge inside.

He grinned at the shell resting in the corner. It wasn't a real gastropod shell, although there were a few extra scattered about, but made of hand-blown glass, red swirling with gold in the design. “Hey Jarvis,” he said, pulling his hand away and moving back to the floor to take inventory. It only took him ten minutes this time, and when he was done, he frowned. Nothing.

Nothing was missing. Everything was here and accounted for, and he let the notebook slap to the floor in frustration. He should have been relieved, but he felt more restless than he had earlier. It was never this hard for him to concentrate on something—in fact, sometimes it was a borderline problem, that he could lose himself so completely in his work and have five hours pass while thinking it had only been one. He suddenly pulled his phone from his back pocket to check the time. If there was one thing he would remember today, it was that it was Friday, and that he had verbally agreed less than two hours ago that he would watch a movie with the rest of his neighbors.

There was still an hour left, and belatedly, he realized that he felt at a loss of what to do until then. He set an alarm for forty minutes later, not trusting his own sense of time at the moment, and tapped his thumb against the screen as he gave thought. He could at least clear his floor of the mess he had made—no use stepping on a servo motor like a Lego brick from hell.

* * *

He could smell the pizza and hear the low thrum of activity before he saw it. Tony made it halfway to the doorway of the communal lounge before he was struck with the abrupt desire to just turn around and go back to his room. Was he…? No. He wouldn’t even entertain the thought and flung it harshly aside instead. He wasn’t _nervous_ , for chrissake, this wasn’t some kind of—

“Hey, 710, right?” someone called out from behind him. Tony turned around and recognized the owner of the voice as the guy who had suggested a movie in the first place earlier in the week.

Tony had heard the words, but the meaning wasn’t there. “Sorry, what?”

“You live in room 710, right?” the guy repeated. At seeing Tony’s hesitant nod, he continued with, “Then that means you’re Tony. I remember seeing you at the meeting. I’m Clint, 706.”

Clint had an easy-going look to him, sporting dark blonde hair that was cut shorter than Tony’s and wearing a polo shirt that still managed to hug his arms.

Brows furrowed, Tony felt like a fish when all he could ask was, “How?” by putting his only-slightly gaping mouth to better use.

But it didn’t take long for Clint to figure out what he meant, and he jerked a thumb back down the hall as he came to a stop by Tony. “Door tags,” he said as an explanation. “And you’re the only one on this floor I haven’t met yet.” He gave Tony a discerning look. “Kind of impressive, actually. Our mutual neighbor thought you might’ve been a poltergeist that haunted him with classic rock music. You going to the lounge, I take it?”

Tony cleared his throat and looked once more back towards his door before stuffing his hands in his pockets and nodding. “Yeah, I am. Lead the way.”

Clint entered the room ahead of him with a wave and a “Yo!” to those already there. “Look who I found in the hall.”

The lounge had been rearranged since Monday’s meeting, the various couches and chairs pushed into a blocky semicircle around the large flat screen TV. In the back of the room were two fold-up tables, several boxes of pizza and liter bottles of soda lined up across them. Loki was there, talking with another resident, and at Clint’s greeting he turned and gave both him and Tony a smile. With a knowing look to Tony, he stepped to the side and made a small gesture to a box on the table: cinnamon sticks. Tony grinned back.

“I’m glad you chose my movie,” Clint said as Loki walked to meet them.

Loki rolled his eyes. “It’s not as if it were hard, when it was requested by so many.” He glanced to Tony and added in a conspiratorial stage-whisper, “He has a habit of stuffing the ballots.”

Clint gasped, pressing his palm to his chest. “I did not!” He turned to Tony. “I do not! I just happen to have others agree with my suggestions.”

“Something of a necessity, it seems, considering you know full well how I feel about your film tastes.” Loki crossed his arms and his expression turned contemplative. “What was that one from last year? ‘Hawk Woman’?”

“Ohhhh, no,” Clint said, shaking his head. “No, you remember what it was. You went to too many stores to find it on DVD to forget the name of it now.”

Loki looked positively mischievous even as he complained. “Only because you whined insufferably about it for weeks. Those were two hours of my life I will never get back, Clint Barton, not including the time it took to locate a copy.”

Showing no hint of remorse, Clint only beamed. “Yeah, but I finally got you to watch it.”

“So what’s tonight’s movie about then?” Tony asked, shifting his weight, feeling more and more like a third-wheel for all they tried to include him, and hating it.

That earned him wide-eyes from the two of them; Loki only mildly surprised, while Clint looked scandalized.

“You’ve never seen it?” Clint asked.

“I don’t watch movies that much,” he admitted and wishing now he had kept quiet.

But Clint didn’t tease him, and instead only looked excited. “Oh man, okay. Well, it’s a bona fide classic”—Loki snorted—“so I’m actually not going to tell you anything about it and just let you have a pure experience.” He pointed sharply at Loki. “No telling him anything.”

“As if you don’t already threaten to smother anyone who talks during a movie,” said Loki, amused, but yielded to Clint’s semi-serious stare. He gave Tony an apologetic shrug. “You heard the man.”

Tony chalked it up to melodrama, but later as the opening titles started he heard Clint hiss from the other side of the couch, “Steve, I swear to _god,_ ” and Loki—who sat between both him and Clint—shared a smirk with Tony. _Told you,_ he mouthed.

The movie, starting out innocently enough, had Tony in various states of serious concentration throughout most of it; and by the halfway mark he was leaning forward with elbows on knees, mouth resting against interlaced fingers. He didn’t even notice Loki setting a cinnamon stick on his plate before he missed out and everyone had eaten them all, the pizza long-since devoured. He had reached for his plate to go and get one himself and found it just sitting there, already frosted.

Loki was watching him from the side, and when Tony caught his glance and raised a brow in a wordless question, Loki inclined his head and refocused on the film. It was chewy, and sweet, and goddamned _good_ , and more than made up for the ending to the movie.

“I can’t believe that’s how it ended,” Tony said in exasperated disbelief when Clint had asked, after the credits had started and the lights turned back on.

“There’re two more sequels, at least,” Clint said, ejecting the DVD from its player. “How’d you like it otherwise? You looked pretty tense for a few parts of it.”

“Yeah, well, this was like every robotics major’s personal nightmare,” Tony joked back. “Rogue AIs and machines? No thanks, not for me.”

Clint barked a laugh. “I didn’t know you were a robotics major! Why didn’t you say anything?” he asked Loki.

Loki gave Tony a strange look before taking the DVD case from Clint with a sigh. “I’m not in the habit of gossiping about information I only know because of my job,” he said, putting it into his bag.

“Was tonight part of your job?” Tony asked from his spot on the couch.

“No,” Loki said with a shake of his head. His hair wasn’t pulled back tonight, and as it fell forward with the movement he tucked some behind his ear. “Events take weeks to plan with budgets to approve.” He shrugged. “I was off tonight, and a movie sounded like a good idea.”

“Oh,” Tony said simply, not sure of how to respond. Was it really that strange, he asked himself, if an R.A. wanted to socialize outside of their work? No, it wasn’t, he determined. Loki was a student too, after all, just like him. In a sense. Excluding the position of power of an R.A.

He got up from the couch and brushed his hands against his pants. “Well, thanks,” he said, fighting the urge to fidget. “I had—it was fun. Need help cleaning up?”

Loki turned to him and gave him a soft smile. “It’d be much obliged.”

Yeah. Tonight was a good night.

It was only a shame he couldn't remember what was so distracting about those _stupid boxes_.

* * *

He ended up stepping on the servo motor, anyway.


	5. Chapter 5

Tony slowly opened his eyes to soft but firm taps, mind still caught in the mid-dream fog where everything simultaneously seemed both real and imagined. With a groan he rolled to face the edge of the bed and called out, “Yeah, hold on,” as best as he was able. Flipping onto his stomach, he finally pushed himself upright, eyes landing on the alarm clock by his head. The bright red numbers read 10:37am, and he fought the urge to curl back under the covers.

“I’m coming,” he said, even though whoever was at the door hadn’t yet knocked again. “Coming,” he repeated, more softly and more to spur himself forward and out of bed than to reassure anyone else.

He yawned loudly into the back of his hand as his bare feet padded across the carpet. He felt like a mess, mind clogged like thick oil that needed to warm up before the gears could unstick themselves. He probably looked like a mess, too, with his unbrushed hair and ratty Iron Maiden shirt, paired with (fantastically) comfortable sweatpants that he found at the school store when he had given up the ghost and admitted the textbooks were actually necessary. (Rhodey had stopped letting him copy his notes in bioengineering, and he _still_ didn’t know how he got roped into taking that class as an elective instead of something he could sleep through.)

“Did I wake you?”

When he opened the door, Tony had seen the concerned pull of a mouth before he fully recognized who it belonged to, brain still lagging behind a block and a half everything else. For once, Loki looked unsure about how to react, compared to the previous conversations that happened over the threshold of this room. Tony wondered if he shouldn’t answer the door half-asleep more often.

He ruffled the hair at the back of his neck, feeling strangely guilty about confirming Loki’s worry despite being the one who had been woken up. “Ah, kinda? No big, really.”

Loki looked disbelieving. “No morning class?”

“Wow, you really do have everyone’s schedule,” Tony said, unable to stop his face from lighting up in amusement. “I _did_ , until I got the email at five in the morning that said it was cancelled because the professor was puking their guts out. Well, I assume, seeing as how the norovirus isn’t a friend to _anyone_ , and even if I did spend all night finishing up a paper for that class, there’s no real love lost.” Tony blinked and refocused on Loki. “Sorry, you’re here for a reason. What’s up?”

“Inspections,” said Loki after a pause, maybe to see if Tony was really done talking. His frown had been replaced by a ghosting smirk. “Your name was pulled. Do you have a few minutes?”

Shit, of course. They _were_ warned for them last week, but Tony had been absolutely ignoring the reality of it. “And here I thought you’d let me sweat for a bit longer,” he said, attempting to laugh it off but failing. He glanced back over his shoulder and cringed when he saw his project strewn across the floor. Looking back to Loki, he hoped for pity. “Room is, uh, kind of a warzone, to be honest.”

“I’ve no doubt seen worse,” Loki countered jovially. He was _enjoying_ this, the sadist.

Tony gripped the handle of his door as he tried not to let a horrifically embarrassing whine escape. “But—”

“You know I can’t let you clean up.” Loki pressed his hand to the door that Tony wasn’t even aware he was closing. “Letting you would diminish the point of a _surprise_ inspection.”

His hand twitched on the doorframe as he chewed on the thought. There wasn’t any getting out of this, and the sooner he agreed, the sooner it would be over. Tony sighed and his arm dropped to his side in resignation. “Fine, okay, but let me at least clear a path. I warned you, okay?”

Tony stepped back to let Loki inside, eyes already cataloging what he needed to move and where, not wanting to see Loki’s reaction. He heard the door being shut behind them, smallest of blessings (at least the clutter of his room wouldn’t be announced for the world to see) and he started nudging parts and schematics towards the bed and wall with his foot.

There were quick glances under his pillow, mattress, bed—all very sterile and professional, Tony would admit to himself if he were honest, as Loki made his way around the room. He watched from his place leaning against the wall, hands cupping his elbows. Loki was looking for dirty secrets, yeah, that was the whole point, but anything not relevant was quickly passed over and not remarked upon. He could’ve been a whole lot more nosy about things, but he wasn’t, and Tony let himself feel relieved for it.

He soon noticed Loki crouching down on the balls of his feet (noticing also short black boots with skinny jeans tucked inside, but when did Tony ever really look at his shoes before?), poking at the remains of a disassembled side project.

Loki turned his head towards Tony with a questioning expression. “What’s this?” He didn’t sound suspicious, baiting Tony into a trap, just _curious_. Tony laughed when he saw what Loki meant.

“The sorry remains of one of those Japanese robot dogs,” he said, pushing himself away from the wall and going to crouch down next to Loki. “I feel kind of bad taking them apart, but you’d be surprised at how much cheaper the motor parts are in mass-produced toys when I need something on the fly to salvage.”

“Aren’t these pretty expensive on their own?” Loki asked, sounding amused at the idea that Tony would strip a robot toy for scrap.

Tony grinned at him. “Cheaper than buying wholesale. Don’t know what to do with the spare ears and tails, though.”

He could’ve sworn he heard a small puff of laughter from Loki as he stood up, (very long) legs suddenly in his field of vision before walking around him. Tony pressed his hands to his knees to stand, wincing when they popped.

Loki stopped somewhere behind him. “What in god’s name is this?”

“Hmm?” Tony turned around. Loki wasn’t looking at him, but at his desk instead, and he followed the gaze to— “Oh, that’s Jarvis.”

Loki was staring at the small tank in the corner of Tony’s desk, standing still as stone as though he’d get bitten if he moved. The clipboard was still clutched in his arm, pen in his other hand pressed to the paper, but his brows were furrowed in thick concentration. He slowly leaned forward to better able peer inside. Jarvis wasn’t moving, his red and gold shell simply resting in the middle of the tank, but soon a small leg came out from inside the shell and tested the ground. Finding it sturdy and seemingly unchanged from earlier expeditions outside, the hermit crab emerged wholly and scuttled towards the sponge in the shallow water dish.

If there was ever a word to _not_ describe Loki, Tony thought, it was “clumsy”; so as Loki suddenly startled from the desk and nearly fell backwards over the chair, Tony could only watch with mild shock.

When Loki finally turned to him, his eyes were wide with a raging undercurrent that flowed from surprise, to disbelief, and finally to growing exasperation, the disappointed betrayal of _I thought you were better than this._

 _Well shit. That’s a familiar look,_ Tony thought, even if he had no goddamn clue why it was suddenly making an appearance now.

“What. Is. That.” Loki spoke slowly, biting off each word. A strange itch crept up the skin of Tony’s neck, and he fought to keep his hands still. Jesus, when the guy was mad—

“That’s Jarvis,” he repeated, trying to keep his voice light. “He’s really cute, ain’t he?”

That’s it, he was a goner. Loki was going to throttle him blue like some kind of cartoon character. He could only hope that Rhodey would take in Jarvis for him so that he wasn’t tossed out for a bird to eat like an appetizer. He was going to die with an unfinished thesis and a mess of a room and no one was going to know who did it, because he was pretty sure Loki knew how to hide a body.

Instead, Loki exhaled a long, shuddering breath through his nose. “When I said ‘if you can hide it, you can keep it,’” he enunciated coolly, “I expected a bit more creativity than hiding away your contraband in plain sight.”

Tony’s eyes widened and he gaped. “Jarvis isn’t contraband! I’ve had him for years. He’s damn near family!”

Upon seeing Loki’s sharp and withering look in response, he amended his statement. “Okay, fine, not family. Roommate. Companion. A desk buddy? Distraction. Think of him as a living screen saver.”

“Tony, that makes no sense.”

“I don’t get it,” Tony said weakly, his shoulders slumping, and he tried to reach some kind of conclusion that _did_ make sense. “Fish are allowed.”

“Yes, _fish_ are allowed.” Loki waved his hand in the vague direction of the small tank, but he still wouldn’t face it again, nor would he turn his back on it entirely. “Not… crustaceans. Whatever that is.”

“Have you never seen a hermit crab before?” Tony asked, a brow cocked, but quickly raised his hands in surrender. “Look, it’s not like you found a cache of booze.”

Loki narrowed his eyes. “Should I be looking harder, then?”

“What? No. I was joking, _geez_.”

It felt like the temperature of the room had dropped to artic levels, and Tony was tensing with a surge of—god, was this adrenaline? Fuck. He needed out of this room.

Loki’s eyes darted over Tony’s face, looking for something and apparently finding it. He pinched the bridge of his nose, closed his eyes, and gave a long-suffering sigh. “Two weeks,” he finally said.

“Two weeks for what?” Tony asked, frowning, arms crossed again and pulled tight.

That green glare flashed in his direction. “Don’t interrupt or I’ll reconsider. Give me two weeks and your absolutely _shut mouth_. If I hear even a _whisper_ of…” he gestured again towards Jarvis as he trailed off, seemingly unprepared and unused to issuing threats, for all else he seemed capable of.

“I’m dead meat,” Tony finished for him. “Got it.”

Loki nodded once. “You’re dead meat,” he agreed. “Two weeks. I’ll be in touch.” He spun around, still remembering to gingerly step around the motors and gears covering the ground, and headed for the door.

It was a terrible habit, unable to leave things well-enough alone, and Tony knew it. But as Loki gripped the doorknob, Tony called out, “So, is that a passing mark on inspections?”

The quiet settled uneasily between them, before Loki laughed, a weary, half-sobbing thing, and didn’t turn back to look at him. He shook his head as he said softly, “Oh, Tony,” and he stepped out and closed the door.

It didn’t slam.

* * *

“I fucked up.”

Tony slid into the seat next to Rhodey, dropping his bag to the floor in front of him. The lecture hall was loud and crowded in the last few minutes before class started, but unfortunately, it did nothing to drown out his thoughts. Nor was it enough to distract him from the tight feel of his stomach as it screamed from both hunger and a petulant desire to avoid food forever.

Rhodey didn’t look up from his phone, thumbs texting at speeds that could match Tony. He was probably talking to Carol. “The test wasn’t worth that much of our grade, man. You’ll get it next time.”

“No, not the _test_ ,” Tony said with a whine. “I did _great_ on the test, I’ll have you know.”

The phone was set aside as Rhodey half-turned to face him. “Then what’s this about?”

Tony slunk further into the seat, watching with morbid fascination as the tall blackboard disappeared behind the bushy ponytail of the girl in front of him. “I can’t actually say.”

_“Tony.”_

“Okay, _okay_ , fine,” Tony hissed, secretly thankful for best friends that pushed for things. “Just." He quickly looked around before leaning in close to Rhodey and beckoning him closer. Rhodey sighed but decided to humor him and slid down in his seat as well. “It’s my R.A.”

Rhodey got through the first syllable of Loki’s name before Tony shushed him quiet. Rhodey gave him a look, _Tony, you’re being paranoid as hell_ , but asked, “Okay? And?” when no answer was forthcoming.

“I had my room inspection today.”

“Ah,” said Rhodey, like that explained everything. “So what’d he find?”

Tony wanted to talk about it. He really _did_ , to talk earnestly and candid and to fuck the two-weeks-rule, (because really, _what?_ ), but even still, thinking about breaking the promise he made wasn’t something he wanted to do.

So he wouldn’t talk about it. He’d let Rhodey figure it out on his own.

“It was the, uh, the thing on my desk. From last year. You know, you liked to hold it.” Tony’s gaze slid past Rhodey’s and met that of a guy in the row ahead of him, who was looking at him like he had eaten something rotten.

“Bro,” the guy said, arm resting on the back of his chair.

Tony frowned. “Who are you? Screw off,” he snapped, and the guy raised a brow before shrugging and facing forward again.

Rhodey snapped his fingers in front of Tony’s face, effectively recapturing his attention. “So he found your _… thing_. The thing I’m pretty sure I told you was probably not allowed. What’d he do?”

“Nothing yet,” Tony said with a sigh, before noticing the professor up front had definitely walked in and was definitely trying to start class, and he had _definitely_ noticed Tony not paying attention.

“Something you’d like to share with the rest of us?” the professor asked wearily, and a hot shame creeped up the back of Tony’s neck. He liked this professor, and he was tired of seeing disappointment leveled at him today. Tony sat up straight and shook his head. “No, Dr. Banner,” he muttered, pulling the textbooks from his bag.

As Rhodey did the same, Tony quickly whispered, “Just, if I disappear in two weeks, I wanted you know that I saw it coming.”


	6. Chapter 6

The thing about avoiding someone who lives on the same floor, is that contrary to initial impressions, it’s simplistically easy to do. After spending the first couple of days post-room inspection on edge and looking around corners, Tony realized how little he saw Loki _anyway_ ; so he eased up, and tried to push their last encounter to the back of his mind. He refused to dwell on if he’d have to give up Jarvis, and he only checked his mailbox when it was the blond sitting at the welcome desk and not tall, dark, and moody.

 _“Give me two weeks,”_ Loki had said, and Tony had no misgivings at all about steering clear of him for that entire time. As long as he kept his mouth shut and went about his normal business and didn’t say anything damning that a network of Loki-spies could pick up on, there was a good chance he’d be left well enough alone.

In the meantime, he’d just have to keep himself distracted. As he set to work on methodically jerry-rigging the start to a small robotic claw, he remembered that Clint had offered earlier in the week to let him borrow the sequels to the one they had all watched the Friday before. For a distraction it would work as well as any, so he set down the screwdriver and pushed himself off the ground.

Tony rapped on door 706 twice before returning his hand to the safe confines of his pocket. If not for the door tags—leaf-shaped, same as his own—reading STEVE and CLINT, he wouldn’t have known who else lived here, though he would have recognized him. Steve wasn’t easily forgotten: tall, broad-shouldered and formidable, but with a Boy Scout face that probably hinted at helping the elderly across the street in his spare time. By carrying them.

“Is Clint around?” he asked, casually peering into the room behind Steve and—

Seeing Loki. Well what he could of him, anyway, which was him lying on the lower bunk of the bed with a book propped up on his chest. _Loki_. Who then saw him at the door, _of course._ Tony’s luck never held out.

Tony immediately looked back to Steve. There was a sharp _oof_ from inside the room and Steve answered, “Yeah, he’s here. Though you might need to wait a few.” He pulled the door open wider and stepped to the side, and Tony could now see Clint sitting on the other side of the bed, hunched over a laptop.

“Nope,” Clint said with a slight wheeze. “I’m good.”

Loki was now sitting—not that Tony was keeping track—with a finger marking his place in the book. He looked something close to guilty while he watched Clint take a slow inhale before standing, and suddenly became re-interested in his book when keeping an eye on Clint also meant that Tony had entered in his field of vision. (Still not keeping track.)

“So, what’s up?” Clint asked, oblivious to the fact that he was harboring in his room exactly the one person Tony had been trying to avoid, and Tony nearly forgot why he had stopped by.

“The movie,” he said after a beat, “from last week. You said it had sequels?”

Clint positively beamed, and Steve laughed from his desk. “Oh no, you’ve done it now. Just take the movies and run. He’ll talk your ear off if you let him.”

“Character assassin,” Clint shot back. “He’s lying,” he said to Tony, gesturing for him to come inside. “I don’t spoil things for people if I can help it. Let me find those discs for you.”

The room soon fell into silence, save for Steve’s typing of keys and Clint hemming and hawing over what looked to be a rather impressive collection in his bookshelf. It was awkward as _shit_. Tony stayed as close to the door as he could while still being considered “inside”, and if it happened to keep him a fair distance away from Loki, then that was a bonus. _“I’ll be in touch”—_ but Loki still hadn’t _been in touch_ with him one way or the other since the inspection earlier in the week. Tony could play this game. He just didn’t mean to run into him on neutral ground.

_But seriously did I interrupt something just now?_

He cautiously glanced to the side despite (to spite) his better judgment. Short black boots resting on the floor, one tipped on its side (he remembered those boots); crossed legs on the slightly-mussed sheets; a page slowly being turned. Loki must have felt him staring, because he raised his head and looked at Tony with an expression he couldn’t read.

Awkward as _fuck_.

“Man, where did I put them?”

Loki rolled his eyes and with a swift movement, grabbed and chucked the pillow at the back of Clint’s head. “This happens every time you organize.”

“I have a system,” Clint murmured, seemingly unfazed, dragging his finger across the thin, plastic spines. “Question is, did I put them in science fiction or action?”

“You know, I can just—you can drop them off later, it’s cool,” said Tony, edging towards the door.

Clint spun to face him with an outstretched hand. “No, wait, I got this. They’re alphabetical by genre and there’s not many genres they could be in.”

There was a loud sigh from the bed and Steve’s shoulders were shaking from quiet laughter, though he had yet to stop typing.

“Well, where’s your ‘futuristic dystopian cityscape with a focus on robots’ genre?” Loki asked dryly. “Surely you put them in there.”

“Actually, smartass,” Clint said—and Tony could see the figurative gears turning even across the room—“I think you’re right.” He bent down to see the lower shelf, and after a brief moment, gave a triumphant “Ha!” and pulled two DVD cases from the collection. “Right next to Metropolis,” he said, grinning at Loki and crossing the room. He offered them to Tony. “Enjoy. Let me know what you think.”

Tony flashed Clint a smile (since it wasn’t like he was avoiding him, too) and said, “Cool, thanks.” And as he booked it down the hallway he heard, “You know you don’t gotta bust my balls literally, you ass,” followed by a shriek audible from behind the now-closed door. There was a momentary pause of concern, before Tony realized he was still avoiding Loki _as per the plan_. Steve was buff; he could handle it.

* * *

“You _traitor_ ,” Tony hissed, pressing his hands to between his legs as he sat at his desk, willing himself to think of everything but

_hands snaking under his shirt, sharp grin with a flash of teeth, bitten skin and silver tongue tracing filigree lines_

that out-of-nowhere, horrific dream about _Loki_ , like what the _hell_.

The sun had been low in the sky last he remembered, and he had woken with a start to a dark room. Only the lamp above him was turned on, and he whispered a disoriented “Oh my god.” His phone started to buzz and hop across his desk, making more noise than anything set to _silent_ should be; and when Rhodey started talking he was grateful for something else to focus on.

“I’m craving a burg, you coming with? Don’t make me go alone.”

Tony held the phone away from his head as he yawned, still feeling the weight of his poorly decided, impromptu nap. ( _Impromptu_ —a kinder term than he deserved for pushing himself past exhaustion. Again.)

“Sorry, yes,” Tony said, feeling an unsettling click in his jaw as his mouth readjusted to its normal range of motion. “Burgers sound great.”

“Tony, I heard that yawn over the phone. You need to sleep, man. Stop staying up thirty hours at a time just because you don’t have a roommate to force you to bed.”

“I do sleep. I just _did_ ,” and that was the problem, at least lately. When he tried to sleep, he couldn’t, and he tossed and turned in the sheets until the electricity running through his limbs was grounded by getting up and taking something apart. And when he didn’t try to sleep, he did, and he slept hard, and it had only taken one missed class for him to set an obstacle course of various alarms around the room to prevent it from happening again.

Rhodey just laughed. “Whatever you say, man. Well look, I’m at Carol’s now, but I’m leaving soon and will be back in the city within the hour. Want to meet at the usual place?”

“Yup, see you then.” And because he couldn’t stay in his room without thinking back to

_hair like ink, flushed skin and nails that graze and dig, green that burns and weight that presses down_

the thing he wasn’t thinking about, he grabbed his bag, left the dorm, and decided to walk. It was stupid; what a stupid idea. Tony got to the burger place in thirty, and by then his hands were like ice from the early October air, but at least the lower turncoat part of him had sat down and _shut up_. He slid into a booth towards the back of the restaurant, ordered a shake and fries to start with while he waited on Rhodey, and pulled the tablet from his bag.

After debating and fighting with himself about it, then saying to hell with it and typing w _hat does it mean if you dream about someone_ into the search bar, he heard from behind him, “Who’d you dream about?”

Tony nearly dropped his tablet to the floor, catching it awkwardly at the last moment. “Rhodey I swear to god,” he said, spinning around and looking up at his friend who was giving him a very amused and knowing look, “I’ll kill you if my heart doesn’t give out first.” He motioned to Rhodey to sit down and put his tablet to the side. “And it was just a se—stress. Stress dream. Hella weird. That’s probably all it was.”

“Uh huh. Nice catch,” Rhodey said with a snort, waving down the server.

_“Shut up.”_

Rhodey ended up ordering a monstrous cheeseburger, as tall as his head and threatening to tip over like a Jenga tower. Tony decided on something only slightly smaller, the earlier shake and fries doing him no favor. When the server left, Rhodey turned his attention back to Tony and raised a single brow. “Really, though?”

“What?”

“ _How to tell if you have a crush,_ ” Rhodey said, like he was reading from an article. _“You’re reading confirmation-bias stuff like this, dipshit._ ”

Tony grimaced. “It’s not like that. At all. You’re reading too much into it.”

“Am I though? You’re the one Googling weird shit in hopes of finding an answer instead of talking to your best friend about it.”

He was right, and Tony knew it. “It’s not like that,” he repeated, twirling the straw in his drink to try and break up the slush. “It’s just weird. I don’t even like the guy.”

Rhodey gave him a doubtful look. “You don’t? Tony, listen to me, the only time you worry this much about someone’s opinion is if you like them. If it was anybody else—if it was your _dad_ telling you to get rid of Jarvis, would you do it?”

“I’d tell him to fuck off,” Tony answered immediately.

“See? So why is this guy any different?”

He didn’t really have anything to say to that. Their food was placed in front of them and Rhodey whistled appreciatively at the sheer amount of it. Tony reached for his burger, but then just let his hand rest on the table instead, propping his chin with the other. “Well first of all, he’s not Howard. And second, I _don’t_ worry about his opinion, it’s just—Jarvis is involved. That’s what’s different.”

It was unconvincing, even to Tony. Rhodey made a thoughtful noise as he eyed him. “Think of it this way—he hasn’t ratted you out yet, right? So maybe he’s not as much as a hardass as he comes across. And look, are you gonna eat that? ‘Cause it’s kind of a waste just sitting there.”

Tony couldn’t help cracking a smile. “Do you mother-hen Carol like this, too?”

“Nah, man, don’t need to. She would’ve finished by now.”

* * *

It happened two weeks to the day. Tony had gotten back to his room after classes in the early afternoon, done for the day, and nearly stepped on the note that had been shoved under his door. He didn’t touch it at first. Bag tossed onto the bed and jacket draped over a chair, he crossed his arms and just stared at it.

A finger tapped against the side of his arm in a nervous habit. The fact it was a note wasn’t surprising. Ever since he had ran into Loki in Clint’s room over a week ago, he had done a pretty fantastic job of only seeing him from a distance. Loki probably wanted to avoid him too, considering he hadn’t even hunted Tony down after he missed (skipped) the hall meeting just the night before. If he was going to get chewed out, it wouldn’t be through a letter. Right?

Tony eased his way to sitting on the floor with the note still lying untouched. He reached out and unfolded it, briefly surprised at the neat, cursive script.

 

_Tony—_

_Inspection passed._

_Disregard earlier inconsistency with rules concerning tank animals. Shouldn’t be a problem in spring; officially next fall semester, at latest._

_Loki_

_P.S. Didn’t miss much at the meeting. Talked about upcoming campus events, details on main bulletin board later this week._

 

Well. That was that, then. Tony let out the breath he had been holding, only realizing when he had tried to take one in and found his lungs still full. On all points, it was good news and Loki didn’t even seem to be upset that he missed the meeting—so why did he still feel discontent about it?

He read the note for a second time. His inspection had passed, Jarvis could stay, and there was maybe something about the rules being changed? Was that why Loki had taken two weeks to give him his results? Because he gotten the _rules changed_?

He was on his feet before he realized it, out the door and back into the hallway, nearly to Loki’s door when it opened. A blonde— _the_ blonde, the one from the desk, the other R.A.—stepped out with Loki just behind. Her eyes were red, like maybe she had been crying, but she gave Loki a soft smile, tucking her hair behind her ear. She rested her hand on Loki’s shoulder as she said, “Thanks,” letting it slide down as she walked off towards the stairs.

Tony ignored the pinch in his gut.

Loki watched her go, but as he went to retreat inside, his eyes landed on Tony. He breathed a laugh, and it sounded weary, shoulders dropping and head shaking. Though even still, he beckoned to Tony, who hesitated but in the end followed after.

The room was large and spacious, bright from the windows even from the early setting of the sun, with the added benefit of having no direct neighbors from its position in the T-shaped hallway. Perks of being an R.A., Tony supposed, and sat uneasily on the edge of the small couch when it was suggested with a pointed hand.

“Did you not receive my note?” Loki asked, breaking the silence. He crouched in front of the mini-fridge on the floor next to his desk, asking Tony with a raised brow a wordless question if he would like anything to drink.

Tony shook his head, then frowned, and clarified. “No to the soda, yes to the note. That’s why I’m here, actually.”

Loki said, “I figured as much,” but his tone was pure observation. He grabbed a can of tea, one of those tall and skinny ones, and leaned against the top of the fridge, nearly sitting on it.

“I wanted to thank you.”

The finger pulling the tab to the can abruptly stopped. Loki looked at Tony curiously. “Whatever for?”

“I know—well, maybe not _know_ , but I can _guess_ that you didn’t make me wait two weeks just to mess with me.” Tony caught his hands fidgeting in his lap and he stilled them. “You did something, and just—whatever it was, thank you.”

There was a sharp _hiss_ as the can was opened fully. Loki pushed himself away from the fridge and took the few steps to the couch, settling down next to Tony. “You were right, you know,” he said, leaning forward with elbows on his knees and can hanging from his hand. “The other schools in the system allow for other aquatic animals as long as the tanks are within certain dimensions.” A faint smirk pulled at his mouth and he glanced over his shoulder to Tony. “Hermit crabs included. I merely brought it up with the director of resident life.”

“Oh,” Tony said, unsure of how to respond and yet feeling strangely moved. Loki hummed in agreement, that a simple _Oh_ did a fine summary of what needed to be said. It was then that Tony recalled what he had seen in the hallway and the slow quietness of Loki now, somehow different from the usual fare. “Are you okay?”

With gathered brows, Loki leaned back and looked at him fully. “What do you mean?”

“It’s just that…” Tony shrugged. “I don’t know, I mean, you look worn out. Even before you saw me in the hallway.”

Green eyes considered him, head tilted like Tony was a peculiar thing for asking. “It’s nothing. It’s fine.”

Tony couldn’t say why he pushed the issue. “I didn’t ask about what happened with—whoever it was just now. I asked about you.”

It was quiet, then. Clasped fingers started their fidgeting once more and Tony just let them do it, when a cool hand placed itself over his own. He looked up to see softened eyes and an easy smile.

“I am, no, I _will_ be fine,” Loki said, and he pulled his hand away to have it rejoin the other wrapped around his drink. “It is nothing out of the ordinary. Thank you.”

Fingers pulled against each other even tighter, and the skin where Loki had touched felt like it was still burning, a trail of fire left in its wake. Tony’s mouth felt parched, tongue suddenly heavy, barely managing to speak and then having words barrel out. “Well, if you ever need an uninterested third party to talk to, hit me up, y’know. If you want. It’s not like I gossip or anything, because I don’t”— _why couldn’t he stop talking_ —“I mean, I barely talk to the other people on this floor.”

Loki’s smile had only widened. “I will take your offer into account.”

 _Shit_ , no, _what’s going on_ , the burning in his hands seeping into his legs and making them restless. “I should—I have homework, I should get going.”

“Of course,” Loki replied, amused, but Tony was already nearly out the door.

Exactly seventeen minutes later, Tony returned, knocking and staring very pointedly at nothing which happened to line up with Loki’s shoulders, just so he didn’t have to see his face.

“So uh,” he said, ruffling the back of his hair with a hand, “maybe I’m reading too much into it, but if you want to maybe go out for food or something and talk about normal stuff— _not_ saying your problems are abnormal—just, you know, other things. I would be okay with that. If you’d like.”

He internally berated himself for being an _idiot, oh my god,_ when Loki answered, “Yes,” breaking Tony of his often habit of stumbling over too many words. It was a full three seconds before Tony could parse that Loki had even _said yes_ , and he looked up in surprise to find quite the face of innocence. “I’m available now,” continued Loki, all calm and smooth, “if you have no other pressing matters.”

Tony stared at him. “Wait, how did you—right. Schedule.” He pondered over this for a moment and then asked, “So, did you memorize everyone’s or just mine?”

There was that slow, familiar grin, and Loki only said, “I’ll go get my coat.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's all she wrote! _for now_
> 
> Seriously, thank you so very much to all of you, who have been so wonderful and supportive of this silly story from the start. I am so very appreciative and touched, especially considering this is the first _completed_ chaptered fic I have written.
> 
> Also big thanks to FelicityGS, who cheered me on in literally the final hours of finishing this. Many, many thanks ♡
> 
> Talk to me at my [Tumblr](http://foxachu.tumblr.com/), and I hope to see you all again soon!


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